The current status of superelastic scattering studies for e^--Na atom collisions

Abstract

New data from a superelastic scattering experiment on e--Na atom collisions at 10, 15, 20, 25 and 30 eV incident energy are presented and compared with existing experimental data and theories based respectively on the distorted wave second-order Born approximation, 15 state close-coupling and coupled channel optical potential calculations. Overall, fair to good agreement is found between theory and experiments for individual atomic scattering parameters. The loss of coherence previously observed by some workers at small scattering angles (5-20 degrees ), is confirmed at 20 eV and also observed at 25 eV. This loss of coherence is poorly modelled by existing theories.